BANGALORE WATER SUPPLY AND SEWERAGE BOARD

Revenue Billing and Collection System 1. Background Bangalore is one of the fastest growing cities in Asia and also the IT hub of India,

renowned as the silicon valley of India. Bangalore is also called the garden city

because of its lush greenery.

Evolution of Water supply to Bangalore

The people of Bangalore were using open wells, lakes and kalyanies as water sources

prior to 1896. The first piped filter water supply was started in the year 1896 from

Hesaraghatta lake built across river Arkavathy. Raw water was pumped to CJF

(Combined Jewel Filter) where it was treated and supplied. The supply was

augmented in the year 1933 Chamaraja Sagar Reservoir built across river Arkavathy

at T.G.Halli, on down Stream of Hesaraghatta Lake. The water supply was managed

by the city corporation till 1964. Due to increase in population & demand the present

source was not adequate and dependable. To bring water from perennial source like

river Cauvery with external assistance, the World Bank insisted to form an

independent Board. The Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board was formed in

1964.

Revenue Billing and Collection System

BWSSB Ganakeekrutha Grahakara Seve (BGS) - Revenue Billing and Collectiion

System of Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) is delivering G2C

services to more than five lakh citizens of Bangalore which is managed by 36 sub

division offices. All the 26 Subdivision offices are well connected through LAN and

offer many services of BWSSB to the citizens of Bangalore. Services offered at these

centers are transparent, empowering the people in real terms and generally provide a

more responsive and empathic administration. The stakeholders include all the

officers of Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board, Bangalore – One (Single

Window Collection System) and Banks handling Electronic Clearance. Many

stakeholders are involved in successful e-Governance – Government officials,

citizens, system integrators and vendors who help to put together and later support the

BGS System. These Stakeholders were consulted at different stages in the project

from the Requirement Analysis to successful implementation. An IT Team was

formed with Chair Person of BWSSB, Financial Advisor, Chief Engineers, Executive

Engineer and Field Level officers to review the SRS and the progress of the project

executed by National Informatics Centre (NIC), Bangalore. NIC deployed a Team of

Professionals to complete the process in the specified time frame. The application was

tested by the third party identified by BWSSB before rolling out to the subdivisions.

After the success of the pilot run the project has been deployed in the Subdivisions.

Feedback from all the levels was collected which helped in improving the application

regularly.

2. Situation Prior to the Initiative

Before computerizing the Revenue Billing activity, manually written bills were

issued. These bills were not giving clear picture about the consumption and other

details to the consumer. Most of the time the percentage of accurancy of the bill was

very less. Manual ledgers were maintained by ledger clerks. As it is said to err is

human, errors were dominating the ledger details. MIS reports required to improve the

overall efficiency were not available.

• In the manual system, the meter reader visits the customers place notes down

the current meter reading and gives the details to the concerned dealing

assistant who calculates the consumption and arrives the amount to be paid by

the customer as per the consumption.

• There is every possibility that the human errors can be committed by the meter

reader while calculating the consumption, bill by applying various types of

tariff and customer type.

• For every 400 customers one ledger was maintained wherein details of

consumption, bill raised, amount realized, balance etc. for each of the

customer in respective ledger folio.

• Customers have to visit respective sub divisional cash counter centers which is

located at BWSSB service station, sub divisional office for payment. These

counters were opened for 4 hours during office hours.

• The payment details are updated in the concerned ledger folio of the customer

by the dealing assistant.

• Any information customer requests BWSSB, the details has to be referred to

the ledger. Similarly for the top management of the Board the information has

to be manually compiled sub-division wise by referring to the ledgers, which

is a time consuming process. This may also lead to error in the final statement

like Demand Collection Balance.

• The top management could not review some of the cases like house locked,

meter damaged, abnormal or subnormal consumption, faulty meters, arrears

etc.

• Large number of manpower has to be deployed of processing the bills and

updating the ledgers.

• The ledger folio, meter reading etc. are not tamper proof.

• Errors in reconciliation of bills paid and delay in money deposited in the bank

was an issue

• The citizens have to visit a number of times in getting new water and sewage

connection.

• There was no mechanism to verify whether the grievances of the citizens were

addressed by the concerned official.

• The management could not have the number of customers, category wise in

each sub divisions. Also consumption details, pumped details and loss of

water could not be arrived.

3. Objectives and Aims

• Computerization of Revenue Billing and Collection Process

• Citizen should get error free bill

• Citizen should be able to pay the bill at their convenient time and place

• The complete billing process to be transparent

• Citizen should get the services from the respective sub divisions without any

hassles

• GIS based customer details

• Top Management should be able to get the accurate Demand Collection and

Balance

• Monitor cases like door locked, meter damaged, meter not working, abnormal

and sub normal consumption etc.

• Work flow based New Connection

4. Strategies Adopted and Implementation Process

Strategies Adopted

• National Informatics Center has studied the manual system, existing sub

divisional level computerization and the requirements of BWSSB

• The existing procedure of generation of bills at Sub Divisional office has to

continue so that the concerned Sub Divisional Staff can own the operations.

• With the existing technology and resources, it was decided that Citizens could

pay their bills ANY WHERE ANY TIME instead of standing in long queues

at respective Sub Divisional cash counters.

• Complete billing process, ledger maintenance etc. should be transparent

• Primary and secondary servers were installed with five client systems at each

of the 26 sub divisional offices

• All the sub divisional offices, divisional offices and head office were

networked though leased line.

• 74 Cash Collection KIOSKs (ATM) were installed at existing cash counters

and also at strategic locations which are convenient to the citizens of

Bangalore to pay their water and sewerage bills.

• Citizens can also opt for payment of their water bill through ECS facility.

• BangaloreOne data center is connected to the BWSSB Head Office through

leased line, so that the citizen can pay their bills in any of the BangaloreOne

center.

• The complete billing and collection process is handled by the BWSSB

employees

• The software was designed and developed by NIC and audited by third party

• Any change in the customer details like commercial / domestic connection,

bore size, meter reading, write off etc. is through Bio-metric authentication

• Audit trial is enabled so that each and every crucial transaction is recorded.

• Access to the BGS application is through user login and passwd

• The bill should be Barcoded so that the details cannot be tampered

• Spot Billing

Implementation Process

The citizens are the primary stakeholders in any equation of governance, and it is their

right to expect service from public servants. BGS strive beyond public expectation in

setting the standards of service. Pre-fixed Reading Days for Meter Readers and

Monitoring the Abnormal, Subnormal Consumption, Issuing of bill showing detailed

demand and previous month Collection details are few unique services offered by the

BGS System. Different levels of Security is maintained in the system - the Bill is

secured by BARCODE, Cash Counter information are Encoded with MAC Address

of the System. Biomatric Authentication is implemented for major operations and

Audit trailing is enabled for major events. The Collection Centres of BGS are 74

KIOSKS Accepting Cash/Cheque , Bangalore One , Cash Counters attached to each

Subdivision and ECS Clearance System. The Collection Data is Captured at the

above Centres through the BARCODE Reader and transmitted to the Head office.

From Head office the data is posted to the respective Subdivisions through SQL

Replication. ANY WHERE ANY TIME PAYMENT is an additional facility provided

to the citizen. The System manages the Collection facility through SQL Merge

Replication Technology which runs 24X7. Single bill with Multiple Payment and

Multiple Bills with Single payment are also accepted in these centres. With all these

facilities there has been a sustained increase in collection and the system is helping

Customers and the Department. After seeing the success the department has integrated

workflow based New Water Connection Module and SPOT Billing is another service

which gives openness and transparency in billing and this ensured more speedy and

fool proof working of the department. Facility is provided for the Customers to lodge

their Grievance through BWSSB Website and IVRS System

5. Situation after Implementation of Initiative

• The complete billing and collection process is transparent

• Citizen is happy to pay ANY WHERE ANY TIME from the nearest KIOSK

instead of cash counter which were in operation for 4 hours.

• Citizen is able to pay the bill as and when they find time and convenient

location. For example when citizen goes for morning or evening walk or BDA

shopping complex etc., the bills are paid since the Cash KIOSK is operational

24 X 7

• Citizens pay at their convenient time instead of waiting till due date. This has

benefited the Board by reducing the credit time (interest to be paid to bank)

• Responsibility of each task is well defined for each of the BWSSB staff

• Biometric Authentication for vital process made the Data secure

• Revenue has increased substantially

• New Water Connection to the citizens is through workflow model

• Databank was made with proper validations and Auditing

• Security in Bill, Receipts are introduced by BARCODE

• Improved the efficiency of BWSSB and achieved strong customer relation

• SPOT Billing made the Meter reader to reduce the traveling by a single trip

and openness in the process

• Any time the Demand Collection Balance can be obtained

• During water adalat any issue with respect to the error in bill can be corrected

in the systems through biometric authentication. Similarly, any issues

pertaining to water supply or sanitation etc. for which action are initiated so

that the citizens are not deprived of water which is a basic and essential for

mankind.

• Complaints received through IVRS and attended by the concerned AEE and

the same is updated. Citizen can query the complaint by inputting the

complaint number through IVRS to know the status of the complaint.

• Operation costs of Revenue Billing and Collection has reduced

6. Outputs and outcomes

• Citizen is happy to pay ANY WHERE ANY TIME from the nearest KIOSK

which functions 24x7, instead at cash counters, which were in operation for 4

hours on working days

• Citizen can also pay the bill by opting for ECS facility

• Citizens pay at their convenient time instead of waiting till due date.

• Early payment has benefited the Board by reducing the credit time

• Revenue has increased substantially from Rs.180 Crores to Rs.455 Crores over

a period of time.

• New Water Connection to the citizens is through workflow model so that the

citizen can know his / her application status

• Security in Bill, Receipts are introduced by BARCODE

• Improved the efficiency of BWSSB and achieved strong customer relation

• SPOT Billing made the Meter reader to reduce the traveling by a single trip

and openness in the process

• Any time the Demand Collection Balance can be obtained

• Day to day interaction with consumers regarding for improved services.

• 99 % of water connections are metered and 100 % billed.

• Citizen gets error free and tamper proof water bill.

• By implementing e-governance the BWSSB revenue has increased

• No user charge is collected from the citizen towards computerization

Future Plan

• Internet payment of bills

• Bill and payment alerts through SMS for those opted for the facility

• Payment through mobile

• Grievances / complaints through SMS and their redressal updated through

SMS

• Integration of consumption through BGS and SCADA data (main pumping

station)

• Establishment of Data Center

Number of Users and Services The following table shows the number of consumers using the above System in Bangalore. Around Five lakhs Customers are using the services. Around 65% of the total Customers are through Kiosk and 30 % are in Bangalore One and the rest are in CashCounters, ECS etc.

SubDiv Metered connections

UnMetered connections

Total no. of connections

1 2 3 4

C-1 18966 319 19285

C-2 12787 491 13278

C-3 18146 158 18304

Total 49899 968 50867

E-1 23098 20 23118

E-2 22313 630 22943

E-3 28264 296 28560

E-4 3550 0 3550

E-5 1621 0 1621

Total 78846 946 79792

N-1 30429 454 30883

N-2 15237 242 15479

N-3 31182 380 31562

N-4 10295 147 10442

S-1 24191 296 24487

S-2 27483 436 27919

S-3 17822 168 17990

S-4 33921 635 34556

S-5 12777 72 12849

Total 116194 1607 117801

SE1 24949 153 25102

SE2 22740 120 22860

SE3 16388 240 16628

Total 64077 513 64590

W-1 31473 325 31798

W-2 32552 272 32824

W-3 25948 1219 27167

W-4 28916 181 29097

W-5 18330 66 18396

W-6 4854 1 4855

Total 142073 2064 144137

Total Number of Users/Connections 545553

7. Sustainability It is important that BGS is designed in a financially, legally, and technologically

sustainable manner. NIC is the technology partner, consultant, developer and

implementer of BWSSB projects. Software was developed using Microsoft based

Visual Basic and SQL Server 2000/2005 with Barcode and Biometric technology. All

The Core business Logic / procedures are written as Database level Procedures. The

core BGS systems was given to reputed third party for testing the functionally and

security. The Board has recruited 4 Technical Engineers and two temporary staff

specialized in Software to support the smooth implementation of the project under the

Guidance of NIC. NIC has given Training to all subdivision staff at the operator,

supervisory and Officer Levels. Since BGS is citizen centric application and water

distribution, billing and collection is core business of BWSSB, NIC has place team at

BWSSB head office to address any critical issues and enhancement of the application.

8. Potential for replication

• The Revenue Billing and Collection Software can be replicated in other Water

Boards, Urban Local Bodies, and Municipalities etc.

• By seeing the success and sustainable the Software was also implemented at

Mandya District in Karnataka

• The software was also implemented at 5 demonstration zones at Belgaum,

Dharwad and Gulbarga Districts in Karnataka

• Other water boards from Kerala and Delhi also studies the success, sustainable

story of the BWSSB.

Citizen is paying water bill at one of the 74 KIOSK (ATM)

Special Achievement in GIS Award by ESRI

Regular Bill Generated through the Package and given to the citizen

Hand Held Device for Issue of Spot Billing

Bill Generated through Handheld device